Monday, January 10, 2011

Russian Space Stamps

Airbrush shadow behind chicken = approval.My Mom and Dad collect stamps and I used to pour through their books looking for color ideas and paint techniques.I used to love the clever ways the artists figured out how to take advantage of limited color printing techniques. I really like the Russian space stamps.

these artists are very aware of two pivotal coloring rules. 1. draw from the color wheels natural triads to create a mood. 2. balance your primary or tertiary colors with neutrals like brown black white or grey.

That stamp with the satellite set on the top right of that abstract globe with clouds flowing into oceans is brilliant. And I love that subtle fade of green space into the background and the fade of the inner frame into the outer on the lower right.

A lot of graphics from totalitarian societies are uber-cool to look at. The Russians were really good at it because they had so many decades at being totalitarian. The Kraut Nazis and the Spinach-eating Fascists only had a decade and a half, tops.

Not too long after the Soviet Union collapsed I met this Russian emigre' at a science-fiction convention selling pamphlets from the Soviet space programs. There was cool stuff in them and lots of neat-o graphics, but the printing was absolutely crappy. The worst! All of that artistic skill at the mercy of really lousy, inferior, poorly made printing equipment.